STEPHEN BRADLEY is to conduct a review into why Shamrock Rovers have had more than a quarter of their players injured at the one time.
The Hoops remain three points off the top of the table, with a game in hand, following their draw away to Shelbourne on Monday night.
It has been a solid, rather than spectacular, start to the season by the Hoops with 19 points from 11 games as they target a record fifth title in a row.
But they have been beset by injuries with Markus Poom, Gary O’Neill, Graham Burke, Seán Hoare, Neil Farrugia, Jack Byrne and Aaron McEneff all unavailable for the Tolka Park clash.
And Bradley confirmed that he and his staff are trying to get to the bottom of why they are suffering from more injuries than normal.
Bradley said: “The availability we’ve had, from now, in this period, has been 72 per cent, is the lowest we’ve had in five or six years.
“We’ve been looking at what we do and how we do things.
“We need to keep examining everything we do and see if it’s something we can tweak, something we can do better or stop doing certain things.
“We’ve been talking for quite some time about it as a staff. The worst thing you can do is bury your head in the sand and think its bad luck.
“72 per cent is the lowest we’ve had in this period so we definitely need to look at it.”
Burke, Farrugia and Hoare are due back soon, as are Byrne and McEneff, both of whom have yet to feature this season.
But O’Neill is set to be sidelined for up to six weeks with a quad injury with Poom pulling up in the warm-up on Monday.
Bradley said: “Markus felt his knee, his quad in the warm-up. He got a bang in Derry and thought he’d be alright but he didn’t feel right.”
Any fears over their absences has been lessened by Conan Noonan when given the chance.
Bradley said: “Conan, there’s no worries there, Conan is ready. We don’t want Gary injured but Conan is ready to play.”
Asked if Shels, who remain top despite not having won in five games, are genuine title contenders, Bradley said: “We’re 11 games in, ask me where we are when we are 20 games in, it really starts to settle then and show what it’s going to look like.
“Right now, it’s far too early to say anyone is a contender or they are not.”
GOVERNMENT
Meanwhile, Bradley believes the FAI has to prove it is trustworthy before it can hope to land significant government funding.
Last June, the association made its case for the state to provide €517million towards its €863 Facilities Investment and Strategy Vision.
There has been little progress in convincing those in power to loosen the purse strings since.
And it was warned by politicians after then chief executive Jonathan Hill’s disastrous appearance before the Public Accounts Committee in February that it was not doing itself any favours.
The heavily-sanded Tolka Park pitch was a reminder of Irish football’s poor infrastructure.
Bradley said: “It’s up there with one of the worst I’ve played on.
“It’s definitely not helped in terms of any sort of spectacle.
“If you were here for the first time, I don’t think you’d come back.
“We’ve all been banging the drum and need to keep banging it because it’s the one thing holding this league back.
“Kosovo have committed €200m to stadiums. In ten years’ time we’ll be wondering why they’ve gone ahead and we’re still stuck.
“We need investment. Crowds are good. I believe the teams are good. Managers are good. We need help with facilities, everyone across the board.
“To be fair to the government, you’ve got to be very comfortable on where you are handing that money to and understand that it’s going to get spent in the right way.
“You’ve got to understand their point of view as well.”